Sunday, October 15, 2017

Q: This is a two-week challenge. Write down the equation:65 – 43 = 21.You'll notice that this is not correct. 65 minus 43 equals 22, not 21. The object is to move exactly two of the digits to create a correct equation. There is no trick in the puzzle's wording. In the answer, the minus and equal signs do not move.

I used to be an advocate of more challenging number/math puzzles. But this one is not worthy of a two-week challenge.

144 comments:

Here's my standard reminder... don't post the answer or any hints that could lead directly to the answer (e.g. via a chain of thought, or an internet search) before the deadline of Thursday at 3pm ET. If you know the answer, click the link and submit it to NPR, but don't give it away here.

You may provide indirect hints to the answer to show you know it, but make sure they don't give the answer away. You can openly discuss your hints and the answer after the Thursday deadline. Thank you.

Remember, this is a two week challenge, so the deadline is Thursday, Oct 26 at 3pm ET.

Thanks again for all your expressions of concern for my situation vis-a-vis the nearby fire and for my ability to assess the risk involved.The fire is indeed in a "fairly remote" area, but then so am I.Since there is not much to say about this week's puzzle, I will tell you that I have been increasingly displeased by my telephone service from AT&T and have been about to drop it for my also increasingly satisfactory cell phone provider (US Cellular).Well the cell phone (and electricity) went blooey for four days while Ma Bell's land line kept me in the world. Until a hour or so ago when a flat bed truck carrying a too-tall mechanical wine-grape harvester down my lane ripped it from its pole.AT&T's robot, after making me push about 47 numbers on my cell phone, assured me they will fix it between 9 and 5 on October 23.

My clients in remote Mendo County (off grid house, well water, etc) were using Hughes net satellite service, though the dish probably got overcooked. 10 years ago or so it was pretty crappy, I remember when I was house sitting it couldn't handle a Skype voice only call. But it's gotten better.

People here have noted the irony, but the post office is required to deliver unless folks happened to go and put a hold or forward on delivery. Most of my mail is junk, I wouldn't miss it, but people get social security checks, etc.

But isn't it nice to wake up on a Monday morning and not hear about people under fire in the west?

This isn’t a hint, it’s just interesting. I worked on this for a while Sunday morning and didn’t get it. Went to bed Sunday night and when I woke up this (Monday) morning, the answer was the first thing that came to mind. I guess my brain kept working while I was sleeping.

I expect relatively few correct answers this week for no other reason than most people are better with words than they are with numbers.

SDB: Good article! I bet his cabinet is always glad when the day is finally over. Of course, the day is never really over when you factor in the tweets starting up.Regarding Trump bringing up past protocol on notifying fallen soldiers' families, when will someone important stand up and ask: "Have you no sense of decency?"

I think it is valid to ask that question to each and every Republican in Congress, 5 members of the Supreme Court, Anyone who is enabling Trump, the Vice President, the Attorney General, and many others.

Since the puzzle was so easy, and in response to 68Charger's reminder of the events in 1954 (attended by Trump's legal guardian Roy Cohn, how about a 2 week creative challenge:

The 6 words "Have you no sense of decency" helped galvanize the nation into rebuking McCarthy and his terror campaign. Can you create a succinct phrase (let's say 10 words maximum) that can do the same for Trump?

The photo is my little memorial, looking down towards the strawbale house that burned in the Redwood Fire last week.

I spoke with the owners yesterday, who were finally allowed to go back on Sunday. The garage survived with only minor singes, but only one small section of one wall of the main house remained. On the right side of the photo are photovoltaic panels on a tracker, which were not damaged and were charging the batteries in the power house, also was not damaged.

Their house was on the southern edge of the fire, so the beautiful valley below was mostly not hit.

They went through the full range of emotions over the last week, as have thousands of others in the area. They have decided to rebuild, a smaller house, and only one story - husband's knees aren't what they were 20 years ago. We didn't discuss whether it would be strawbale again.

Strawbale walls have an "official" R value of 32 in California, roughly the equivalent of a 10" thick wall with fiberglass insulation. The actual value is probably a bit higher, the testing results varied for many complicated reasons, and the state chose a conservative value.

Strawbale construction is about 10-15% more expensive than conventional, most of that expense is from the thicker walls (which means wider foundations and more roof area), plastered interior walls rather than drywall, and some complications installing doors and windows, electric wiring, and plumbing.

California and Colorado have the most strawbale buildings in the US, including many open for visitors. Hidden Villa in Los Altos Hills is probably the closest to Palo Alto.

I’m debating retirement building, and container construction is currently leading the pack. Looking for something mid-state, like Carmel Valley or SLO. I’m not sure insulation will make a huge difference in this climates.

I’m curious about the plaster. I get the other stuff, but why not drywall?

Carmel Valley and SLO (San Luis Obispo for others) certainly have mild climates, so the benefits aren't as significant as, say, the Central Valley or the Sierras. But if you want to do an energy efficient house you greatly benefit from more insulation than the codes require.

I haven't worked with container construction, my concerns are the limitations in size, especially ceiling heights, and they typically use the more toxic rigid insulation. I have done several prefabricated modular homes, mostly in the Half Moon Bay area.

Two reasons for plaster: strawbales are imperfect blocks, with lots of bulges. You can shave them to be flatter, but will never get the tight seal with the drywall boards. This will create convective air currents in the void, which is not good for energy performance. You also need to provide additional wood to attach the drywall, defeats a lot of the environmental advantages.

Years ago at one of our conferences a guy did a presentation about fire danger in strawbale houses, with a case study of the fire spreading quickly. We were all confused about how this could happen until he said the magic words "drywall interior walls", and we knew exactly what happened. If there is a fire in the wall it will spread quickly through the chimney effect created by the air space between bales and boards; this is avoided in standard wood construction with horizontal fire blocking. Quick aside, only the inside face of the exterior strawbale walls need to be plastered, in most houses the interior walls are standard wood with drywall, though I did a school with a strawbale interior wall to acoustically separate noisy woodworking from the quieter classroom.

I assume it is/was in Redwood Valley, just a few miles from me in Potter Valley.Most of the homes lost in the fire were there, three hundred or more in a small area, and probably 10 or more dead when the counting is over. I used to live there, but have yet to make the short trip to see it first hand.

Yes, it was above Redwood Valley. I think they are still restricting access to the burn area, but don't know that for sure. And thanks for the numbers, the Santa Rosa Press Democrat has some of the best coverage, including harrowing stories of escape, sad stories of loss, and inspiring stories of heroism and survival. And a good map that is constantly updated.

Must be a different SRPD than the one I have wasted money on for 45 years.There has been lots of Sonoma County pics and maps, but he Redwood/Potter Valley fire has gotten essentially no coverage in ten days.

MJ, I agree the Press Democrat has been Sonoma focused, secondarily Napa, and Mendo is a distant third. I suppose Lake County is an even more distant fourth.

Unfortunate, but they cover what they know, and the fire did race through a large city. One doesn't expect a Kmat and Applebee's to burn. Besides, rural folk "Knew What [They] Signed Up For", so deserve less sympathy, right? I heard it from the jackass' mouth.

I see the Ukiah Daily Journal has more local coverage, but of course is a smaller paper.

He gave himself a 10 for helping PR. Something is really not right with him. I get really scared thinking about the damage he can do. By the way, I doubt he will be asked to work for Hallmark writing sympathy cards.

They said the international puzzle convention thing was this week in India; I suspect that's why this amazingly difficult challenge is 2 weeks. They'll probably have a pre-recorded on air puzzle with a celebrity during the puzzle segment. I suppose all of the segments are pre-recorded, just not with celebrities.

Regarding ecoarchitect's latest excellent Bonus Puzzle:Keep intact the first and last names of eco's "well-known sports personality" and remove any spaces. Replace three consecutive letters of this result with two different letters to form a word. That word is a symbol that the "certain politian" may once have embraced, and perhaps still embraces. A 3-letter synonym of that word describes the "certain politian" perfectly.Hint: Using A=1, B=2, C=3...Z=26, the sum of the alphanumeric values of the three letters you replaced equals 30, which happens to be the identical sum of the alphanumeric values of the two letters with which you replaced them.

Fellow Blainiacs:Why not fill our two-week puzzle void by sampling seven fresh puzzles that will be posted on my Puzzleria! blog, after midnight PDT tonight... and every Thursday/Friday midnight, Pacific Time?* Two of them are Riff-offs of Will Shortz's current NPR puzzle that I trust may be a tad more tricky.* Two others are pretty challenging (I think) puzzles in which I ask you to "translate" algebraic equations into English poetry.* One involves body parts and pure wordplay.* One is a relatively easy puzzle about best-selling author that, eerily, somewhat echoes eco's latest bonus puzzle. * One asks the solver to find a city on the world map, and its climate. (skydiveboy and other geography wonks may especially appreciate this one, I hope.)

Seriously, I sincerely invite all of my fellow puzzle aficionados to visit us on Puzzleria! Sample our puzzles. It's like a buffet; check out what looks appetizing. Then help yourself to "all you can solve..." or "all you care to solve."

That is very kind of you to say, Buck Bard. Thank you. I do admire WS, however.He has a lot on his plate: attending and hosting puzzle conventions;treating his table tennis avocation as a vocation;editing and cranking out a NYT crossword puzzle 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year(!);hosting and running national crossword puzzle tournaments; andoh yes, conducting weekly NPR on-air and lapel-pin challenges...And he has been doing this stuff for decades.I spend almost all my waking hours working on puzzles for my blog, and it has, I realize, room for improvement. I am frankly in awe of people people like you, eco, sdb, Word Woman, Paul, ron, jan, Natasha, ViolinTeddy, Mendo Jim, Jim, Rob, Chuck, cranberry, SuperZee, 68Charger, clotheslover, Ralph Loizzo,...and Blaine(!) etc. etc. etc., many of whom I know have active and productive lives, actually producing goods and services and doing good works... and yet still find the time to contribute wisdom and creativity to this blog and to my Puzzleria! blog.I guess what I'm saying is that I really appreciate all of you... and Will Shortz as well.But, again Buck, thanks.

Paul,Great reference to a great clip of a great film. If anyone else gets confused by Paul's link that takes you to the end of the clip, try this one.

Of course the answer to the original bonus puzzle is Don King, which flips to (Mad) King Don. He actually managed to do something not stupid, proving that even a broken crock (of s**t) can be right twice a day.

Excellent riff, Lego, I hadn't thought of the donkey transformation, interesting that i+n+g and e+y letters add up to 30.

Lego, I also have some thoughts on your puzzle blog, I will try to clarify them over there, but not at this hour of night.

This seal is very intelligent, very handsome. His children are very beautiful, very handsome. They have the highest IQs than any racist or anybody in this county. And we love him, and he will continue to run this country, and his children will too.

Name a well-known geographic location, 7 letters. Remove the first letter to get another well known geographic location, though it often goes by another related name. Hint: you can walk from one location to the other, but no farther. And it is a very long walk.

Either the puzzle is too hard, everyone is working diligently on the incredibly difficult 2 week challenge, or folks are doing other things.

So here are some big hints: both regions are very large, one is larger and more populous than California, the other is larger and more populous than Texas, and there is more than 4000 miles of land between them - no oceans or seas.

While I did notice in your puzzle description that you did not say cities or specific points, I still was looking for something smaller due to your hint about not walking farther. I am also heartbroken that it was not about Renton, where Boeing has a nearby plant.

Is Renton as boering as it seems? I was trying to figure out a way to say they were at opposite ends of a land mass, "not walking farther" was the best I could do. Liberia/ Siberia would make a good WS puzzle.

After my 3 years in the Army and returning to Seattle I went to work at Boeing. I began at the Main plant where their corporate headquarters were at the time. I eventually was transferred to the new Everett facility where they were building the not yet completed 747s. I had the run of both of those places because I was a tooling expediter. This meant I could go anywhere and search for these tools. The tools were not tools in the traditional sense, but templates and jigs and such of all kinds of shapes, sizes and descriptions. We were also required to find and deliver to our respective shop locations REPTs. These were grey or caramel colored plastic sheets that were similar to paper blueprints. They were in two sizes. Most of these were 65- and the others were 69-. The full descriptions were something like, 65-50119-2035. Everyone hated having to look for REPTs because they all looked the same when rolled up, except for the two different sizes. I was the outlier. (No surprises here) I hated searching for the physical tools, but loved being able to remember the numbers of the REPTs in many cases and where they were likely to be found, or had been removed to. I was the only one who could easily handle this job, including all the supervisors and leads, and so it was assigned to me to locate and deliver these alone. I got my days work finished early and hid out the rest of the time.

So, to your question, I never worked in the Renton plant, but the town of Renton is indeed a really boring place. It is at the very South end of Lake Washington.

I saw the first landing and takeoff of a 747 (#001) at Boeing Field (King County Airport).The actual first flight was at Paine Field in Everett on 2/9/69.That aircraft has returned to Boeing Field as an exhibit at The Museum of Flight.I have only been able to find one photo of that event, which my Pilot's Logbook indicates was probably on February 28, 1969.Boy, did it look BIG.

That's probably about right. There is a photo of the first 747 being rolled out. They had us all outside for the big moment. I have no strong memories of the event although I was there for it. Other than the photo-op, it was just another day for me.

I used to occasionally have to look for something that might have been inside or on top of one of the many 747s that were near completion inside the huge building. I would sometimes walk on top of a wing all the way to the end and then turn around and, while looking at the fuselage, bounce up and down. It was a hoot.